Earth today | Small island states call for dedicated climate funds from developed countries | New

The ALLIANCE of Small Island Developing States (AOSIS) urges developed countries to respond positively to the call for dedicated funding for Small Island Developing States (SIDS) in anticipation of the anticipated devastation of climate change.

“A just transition should and can be accelerated, if only developed countries commit to leading with integrity. They must deliver on their pledges, such as $100 billion a year for climate finance – a figure they have missed, while spending five times the amount on fossil fuel subsidies,” the Ambassador noted. Walton Webson, President of AOSIS, who has represented the interests of 39 small island states and low lying coastal developing states in international negotiations on climate change and sustainable development since 1990.

“The global architecture to address climate change is failing SIDS. It is essential that we implement a fair system where vulnerable populations and small economies no longer pay the price for the destructive emissions of the developed world,” he added in a statement to the media on June 6.

AOSIS’s renewed call comes as subsidiary bodies of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) meet in Bonn to prepare for the upcoming climate change negotiations (27th Conference of the Parties [COP] to the UNFCCC), scheduled for this month of November.

“…AOSIS strongly believes that this year’s Glasgow Dialogue should come to the conclusion that a new Loss and Damage Financing Mechanism is needed and will be adopted at this year’s COP, so that future Glasgow Dialogues until 2024 can operationalize the mechanism,” the Ambassador said. Conrod Hunte, lead climate negotiator for AOSIS, at the opening of the Bonn session.

GLASGOW DIALOGUE

The Glasgow Dialogue was set up between parties and stakeholders during the Climate Talks (COP26) held in Scotland last year to discuss how to fund activities to “avoid, minimize and address loss and damage associated with the adverse effects of climate change”.

“We reiterate that position here today, and signal our position for an agenda item on the financing modalities at COP27 and CMA 4 (the Conference of the Parties serving as the Meeting of the Parties to the Paris) to help bring this to fruition,” Hunte added.

Meanwhile, AOSIS revealed that as negotiations intensified at COP26 last year, they were leading the effort for countries to create a concrete mechanism for financing loss and damage in what he described as “a transformative movement that would have given SIDS the opportunity to recover from climate change”. disasters without costly indebtedness”.

“However, in the interest of reaching an agreement to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, AOSIS made a significant concession after receiving a take-it-or-leave-it agreement to create the ‘Glasgow Dialogue’. “…While not satisfied with the final text of the Glasgow Dialogue, AOSIS is committed to engage constructively in the dialogue…towards a clear destination for real action to protect SIDS threatened by climate impacts” , AOSIS said in the statement.

AOSIS also called for “revised and strengthened Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) or national targets, by September, from the G20 major emitters, where countries take responsibility and take the necessary actions to to halve emissions in this decade”.

The NDCs reflect each country’s contributions to reducing greenhouse gases, which fuel the impacts of climate change – from global warming to sea level rise and extreme weather events, including hurricanes. , which have hit a number of Caribbean islands in recent years.